04 | March | 2013 | Existential Ennui

Tags

diets, food, Intermittent fasting, lifestyle

So I lied.

So sue me.

I said that I was through with dieting and I meant it.

Until I didn’t.

I have walked 6 days a week and swam 3 days a week for eight months–nine hours of continuous physical movement per week.

I have stronger legs, stronger arms. I have a back that hurts a great deal less. I have more stamina. I have better wind. (no, I don’t fart better!) I have bigger muscles, not that I or anyone else cares.

I have lost not a single ounce.

It’s not about vanity. I dumped vanity as my companion about three years into my marriage, figuring it was a “for better or worse” thing and well, appreciate the meals and cleaning, because I’m not dying my hair, or worrying about stubble no more.

It’s not about health per se, since I’m feeling fine, and figure my exercise routine does a pretty fine job keeping things running normally. But that doesn’t mean it couldn’t be better.

No, it’s about not being able to bend over very well, or being able to kneel down and get up again without a winch. (kidding, but damn it’s a struggle all the same) It’s about not being able to do yoga because downward facing dog is more likely to end up with my face planted in the tiling.

It’s about my weight impinging on my back and my feet. Sooooo, as they say, I found another diet.

But, it’s not a diet per se. It’s more like a lifestyle change. It’s called the Intermittent fasting, or 5-2 diet. You fast 2 days and eat regularly 5. You don’t fast 2 consecutive days. You try to not be a pig on the five, but eat normally. On the fasting days a woman consumes 500 calories, and a man 600.

It seems reasonable. It has not yet been studied long-term, but short-term results are promising in terms of blood chemistry and weight loss. Blood pressures go down, blood glucose return to normal, and there is some evidence that it suppresses cancer and heart problems and increases longevity. Mice live longer than normal on it.

People anecdotally claim that they mostly lose weight (although some find that their “feast” days are so out of whack that they have to learn what is “normal”). They claim that they feel more energetic. Many claim that they feel they can stay on this forever when they finally reach their norm. Apparently the fasting days are not so extreme that the body has time to go into starvation mode which is what ruins most diets in the long run. And it’s not a diet per se so much as a way to control calories for life without having to try very hard.

I’m game.

Because it’s calorie restricted on two days it encourages foods that are low in calories yet bulky, like veggies and fruit. You are encouraged to eat a wide range of healthy food the other days.

I’ve made some changes already. I haven’t had chocolate since Ash Wednesday and I’m finding that I don’t miss it that much, substituting my afternoon snack of chocolate with an apple. I’m off all corn syrup fructose drinks, drinking about two traditional 12 oz Cokes a week, instead of about six a week of the bad coke. I also can get Sprite and Fanta Orange! I just love the orange, wish they would have the grape too!

So, I’m giving it a ride. Because I don’t have to give up anything, just amounts a couple a days a week. One day will be Sunday, since it’s FFY day (fend for yourself). The other? I’m not sure. Tuesday I suspect.

Everybody is doing something it seems. Even Michael Moore walks every day for thirty minutes. He doesn’t care about losing weight. He cares about feeling better and he finds walking enjoyable.

I haven’t changed my basic premise. Diets don’t work. Because diet implies an end. And the end is where things go wrong again. For most of us at least. And I do think you can be big and healthy. And I don’t think ultra skinny is healthy or attractive. And I do believe in eating real food as opposed to boxes of crap. And I do just want to enjoy doing things as long as I can.

So there it is.

Call me a hypocrite, or a liar, or a dumb broad who finally woke up. I’m all, none or something else entirely. I’m just doing what I want to do. And I don’t care who thinks what.

But, seriously, what do you think?

And NO, that’s not me! I’m still rockin’ gorgeous!